


Now and Forever

by mikkimouse



Series: Tumblr Fics [179]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Established Relationship, Letters, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-10 21:32:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12920676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikkimouse/pseuds/mikkimouse
Summary: While helping Keith clean out the shack, Shiro finds a box of letters.





	Now and Forever

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt "Exchanging Letters" from [this prompt list](https://mad-madam-m.tumblr.com/post/164991585155/lustanddai-sweet-affectionate-moments-meme) and originally posted to Tumblr [here.](https://mad-madam-m.tumblr.com/post/167807322850/sheith-25-please-for-the-affectionate-prompt)

Shiro found the shoebox under the couch. “Hey, Keith, what’s this?” 

Keith didn’t respond. Probably still out back, then. 

The box was dirty, one corner falling apart, and Shiro flipped the top off to see what was inside. Probably something he’d need to set aside for Keith to go through later, but there was a chance it would just be trash. 

It wasn’t. It was packed to the brim with letters. 

Shiro started to set it aside, but paused when he saw the top three letters all had his name on them. 

He frowned and picked up the first one. 

_Shiro –_

_Something weird’s going on out here. It’s been three months since I came out to the desert, but the strange energy that drew me here isn’t going away. If anything, it’s getting stronger. I just wish I could figure out what’s causing it._

_I’m going back out to the bluffs again today. Wish me luck that I find something._

_\- Keith_

With a jolt, Shiro realized the letter was _years_ old, from after Keith had been kicked out of the Garrison, but before they’d found the Blue Lion and Voltron. 

He opened the next one.  


_Shiro –_

_It’s been six weeks since you left and it still sucks that you’re gone. Nobody else can keep up with me in combat training and I overheard Iverson grumbling about retooling the simulators because I keep acing the simulations._

_On the plus side, by the time you get back, I’ll probably have beaten every record you ever set. So far, I’ve broken five._

_I hate not getting to talk to you every day, but this is better than nothing._

_\- Keith_

Shiro stared at the letter, lightly tracing the words. He remembered a conversation, half-joking, half-serious, from the days before the launch. 

_It’s going to suck that we can’t talk while you’re gone_ , Keith had said, kicking the ground. 

_Then maybe we should write_ , Shiro had suggested. _I’ll write you letters, you write me letters, and we’ll exchange them when I get back._

Keith hadn’t said anything committing one way or another then, but Shiro had started writing letters anyway on the trip out to Kerberos, saving them in a private part of his daily log. 

Apparently Keith had started writing letters, too. 

Shiro kept reading them, unable to stop himself. None of them were dated, and they seemed to be thrown into the box in a random order. Some of the letters were written while Keith was still at the Garrison, talking about his classes and simulations and complaining about studying and final exams. Others were from after he’d moved out into the desert, talking his way through his search for the strange energy that had brought him out here. Some were only a couple of lines long, while others were a few paragraphs. 

One was crumpled and dirty, like it had been wadded up before Keith had smoothed it out and folded it to fit with the others. Unlike the others, it didn’t have his name written on the outside, but Shiro opened it anyway. 

_YOU LIED. YOU LIED YOU LIED YOU LIED YOU LIED YOU LIED YOU LIED YOU LIED._

_You said you’d come back. YOU PROMISED. YOU PROMISED ME._

_YOU LIED._

“Shiro? What’s wrong?”

Shiro jerked his head up from the letter to see Keith standing in the doorway between the kitchenette and the main room, brow creased in concern.   


He had the sudden feeling that maybe he shouldn’t have been looking at the letters. “I—” 

Keith’s gaze dropped to the box of letters in Shiro’s lap, and his eyes widened. “I forgot about those.” 

“I found them while I was cleaning,” Shiro said, by way of explanation. 

Keith walked over and sat beside him, and took the letter out of Shiro’s hands. He rubbed his thumb along the paper. “They told us about the mission failure at lunch one day,” he said quietly. “I don’t remember a lot of what happened after that. Just being on the roof after lights out, but the rest of that day is kind of blurry.” 

Shiro put his arm around him and pulled him close, resting his head against Keith’s. It hurt, the grief in the letter and the pain in Keith’s voice even now. It didn’t matter that it was so many years ago, it didn’t matter that they were here together; Shiro just wished he could go back in time to tell him everything would be okay. “Keith—” 

Keith grabbed the box off Shiro’s lap. “There’s another letter in here you should read.” 

“There is?” Shiro asked. 

Keith nodded and dug through the box. He put a handful of letters on the couch beside him, browsing through the ones he found until he picked one out, skimmed it, and then handed it over to Shiro. “Here. It’s one of the last ones I wrote before you crash-landed back on Earth.” 

Shiro took the folded piece of paper and read it. 

_Shiro –_

_Today’s been a bad day. I feel like I’m closer than ever to figuring out what’s going on out here, but I just…I miss you so much. I probably shouldn’t be writing these, or I should probably be trying to let you go, but I can’t right now. I can’t._

_I love you._

_I wish I’d told you before you left. I almost did, but I swallowed the words down instead. I thought, right before you left? When there was nothing either of us could do about it before you came back? That was cowardly. You didn’t deserve to have that dropped on you out of nowhere, where you couldn’t respond. I thought I’d tell you when you got back. When we could figure things out then, if we needed to._

_Then the mission failed and I realized I’d never get the chance._

_I hate it. I hate that I never got to tell you and I hate that I’ll never know if you felt the same way. Sometimes, I thought maybe? Maybe? Other times I thought we’d just stay friends. I spent months seeing two different timelines, one where we were together, another where we’re friends and you find someone else, but always with you in my life in some way. Because I can’t picture my life without you in it._

_And now I have to. Now I have to deal with the fact that I wake up in a world where you’re not here anymore. Where the very thing we both love is the thing that took you away from me. Where I’m never going to spar with you again, or see you smile, or give you shit when I beat you in the simulator. I’m never going to see you fall asleep on your books again, or feel your hand on my shoulder, or see the way your eyes light up when you’re talking about the universe._

_I love you._

_I don’t know why the mission failed. I know it wasn’t pilot error, not like the Garrison says. I know you wouldn’t have let that happen. I think that makes it worse, somehow, that everybody blames you for something I know isn’t your fault. Can’t be._

_The only thing that makes it bearable is the thing that somehow makes it even worse: you didn’t leave by choice. Everybody else left by choice, but you…I think you wanted to stay._

_Which makes me even angrier that the universe took you away from me. Neither of us had a choice in the matter._

_I feel like the counselor at the Garrison would tell me that I should be moving on, because it’s been a year and I’m not, but…I can’t. I can’t, because it feels like you’re still out there, somewhere. And if there’s even the slightest chance of that…I can’t give up hope. I can’t move on. I can’t do any of that until I know, beyond a shadow of doubt, that you really are gone._

_I love you, Shiro. I love you. I love you._

_And I’ll never give up on you._

_\- Keith_

Shiro read the letter again. And again, his throat getting tighter each time. “Keith,” he finally said, but no other words came out. 

Keith shrugged, but it was the jerky shrug he gave when he was trying to pretend something wasn’t important to him when it really was. “I just…I wanted to tell you. Writing them felt like talking to you, even after I thought I’d never see you again. And at that point, it felt like hiding not to tell you, even if it was just in a letter you’d never read. I didn’t want to hide my feelings for you anymore.” 

“ _Keith_ ,” Shiro said again, and hauled him onto his lap to kiss him as hard as he could. 

They’d only been together a few months, having danced around their feelings for longer than Shiro would care to admit. It was still new, still fragile enough that Shiro had worried he might step wrong or say the wrong thing, and he would lose Keith forever. 

Now he knew he wouldn’t. 

“I love you, too,” he whispered between kisses. “In case that wasn’t obvious.” 

Keith smiled. “I got that, yeah.” 

Shiro lowered his head to Keith’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I left you alone for so long.” 

Keith huffed and trailed his fingers through the short hair on the back of Shiro’s head. “That wasn’t really your fault. It was the Galra. And I feel like completely destroying their intergalactic empire is a very small price for them to pay for that.” 

Shiro closed his eyes and laughed. “If only they’d known how protective you are. They’d never have set foot in our solar system.” 

He could feel Keith’s smile against his hair. “Damn right.” 

Shiro lifted his head so he could look Keith in the eyes, and brushed his thumb along Keith’s cheek. “I had planned on kissing you when I got back, you know.” 

Keith’s eyes widened. “You did?” 

Shiro nodded. “I realized on the mission how much I missed you. And I told myself, when I got back to Earth, I wasn’t wasting another minute without telling you what you meant to me.”

Keith rested his forehead against Shiro’s. “If I’d known that, I’d have kissed you the first day you were back on Earth.” 

Shiro sighed. “I feel like we missed out on a lot. I wish…” 

_I wish I’d been able to tell you sooner. I wish we’d been able to have_ this _sooner_.

But he couldn’t quite find a way to say the words. 

Keith kissed his nose, right over his scar. “I think that just means we have to spend the rest of our lives making up for lost time, huh?” 

Shiro smiled and tipped his head back, inviting Keith to kiss him again. “I guess so. And I guess I have a few letters to write to make it up to you.” 

Keith grinned and leaned closer. “Yeah, I guess you do.” 

***

Shiro’s first letter was short, simple, and to the point, and Keith found it on the floor beside their sleeping bag when he woke up the next morning. 

_Keith –_

_I’m outside with breakfast. You looked too peaceful for me to wake you. Come join me whenever you’re ready._

_I love you, now and forever._

_\- Shiro_

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [Tumblr](https://mad-madam-m.tumblr.com/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/mad_madam_m)!


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